


The Secrets We Keep

by Ali3ghouse



Category: Star Wars - All Media Types, Star Wars Episode VII: The Force Awakens (2015), Star Wars Episode VIII: The Last Jedi (2017)
Genre: A chance encounter, Friendship, Gen, Help, Lifetime, Mechanic!OC, Mysterious OC, Old Friends, Secrets, Tatooine, Trust, hidden past, living alone
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2018-01-19
Updated: 2018-01-19
Packaged: 2019-03-06 19:33:38
Rating: Teen And Up Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 2,598
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/13418160
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/Ali3ghouse/pseuds/Ali3ghouse
Summary: Set after TFA & TLJ (covering for spoilers).OC is a mechanic and tech-head, living the quiet life on Tatooine and taking business as it comes. One day an X-Wing appears in the sky, and its pilot asks for her help. Unexpectedly, this encounter will trigger a chain of events with the potential to reunite her with the organisation she ran away from. There are secrets, hidden for a long time, that are going to resurface when certain people come knocking...





	The Secrets We Keep

**Author's Note:**

> I’M SO SORRY ITS BEEN SO LONG SINCE I POSTED! 
> 
> I watched The Last Jedi recently, and then went to watch it again :3. I love Poe’s character transformation in this film, and both the relationship he has with Leia and BB-8.  
> Hence, this is what my brain did. It’s the longest plot idea I have had, so had to write it. 
> 
> Hope you enjoy!
> 
> EDIT: This was originally a Reader Fic, but after consultation with a friend, it’s now an OC! Feel free to self-insert, no major descriptors given.

Ali lounged in the chair outside her home, on an expectedly baking hot day, taking advantage of the lack of business.

This wasn’t a surprise; it’s not really like she advertised her business to anyone, and even if so there were no discerning features of the local landscape that could point people in the right direction.

 _Turn left at the giant sand dune, carry on through the sand valley and if you reach Mos Eisley, you’ve gone too far!_ She joked to herself, while her treasured yet aged droid bumbled slowly across the compressed sand, not going too far out so as to be stuck… again.

A ship appeared in the sky, and that wasn’t a total surprise either as Tatooine was hardly the least visited planet in the world. What was more of a surprise is the shape it formed as it got closer.

“An X-Wing?” She gasped to herself, knowing who that meant was inside. It had been a long time since she’d seen a rebel ship.

Ali stepped out from under the shaded front to the hemispheric house and looked up to the sky, ignoring the blistering heat on her skin.

The ship became larger and larger, its position lowering quickly until it was clear it was scanning the surface for something. It came closer and she waved emphatically, not sure if the pilot could see her or not, but worth a try nonetheless.

Happily, the ship plonked itself down in front of her, and the cockpit door gradually opened upwards. “Hi!” She shouted out to the pilot.

“Hey, I’m looking for someone in particular; one Alana Creeder.”

“Well congratulations, you’re in the right place! Although Ali is fine. How can I help?” He got out from the cockpit with care, and lowered himself off the wing.

“It’s my droid, something’s up with him. He can’t seem to stay still or move in a straight line.” From below the ship appeared a short little round droid, who after landing onto the sand immediately rolled forwards so the domed head hit the ground.

The pilot dove under the ship and grabbed the BB series droid, before hoisting him up in his arms and looking back at Ali. The desperation in his eyes as he looked for some sort of hope showed her how much the little sphere meant to him, and she was almost certain she knew what was up.

“Alright then, why don’t the both of you come inside?” She responded cheerfully.

“Thank you, thank you so much,” Poe breathed as he rushed inside cradling his friend, and relished in the shade of her house.

Ali followed in afterwards and directed him to her workspace, gesturing him to place the droid down on the metal table positioned there. From one of the shelves she retrieved a circular piece of rubber intended to hold the droid in place, and guided the orange and white droid to sit inside.

“Now then, who do we have here?”

“His name’s BB-8, and I’m usually fine in maintaining him but all of a sudden this happened and I couldn’t tell what was wrong-”

“Hey,” she cut in, turning to her new acquaintance, “don’t panic. We’ll get this straightened out, won’t we?” Ali was directing the question more so to BB-8, and received a series of (albeit nervously shortened) beeps back.

Remembering her manners, she asked her customer “Sorry, I didn’t get your name?”

“Oh, Poe. Poe Dameron.” He held out his hand, and she shook it, noting how dry his hands were. _Could be the climate, could be stress_  she noted, unnecessarily.

“Right then, BB-8, let’s have a look shall we?”

 

* * *

  

Ali turned away to retrieve her toolbox and diagnostics machine from the shelves. “Okay BB-8-”

“BB is fine.” Poe added quickly.

“This machine is just going to look at how all of the wiring’s working and see if there’s an electrical fault. I’m letting you know because it requires me to plug it into you, okay?” She waited while the unit seemed to think it over, before giving a quiet chirp of approval.

“Alright then.” With care, Ali exposed the ports around the back of the droid (although given its spherical nature, one could argue about what was the back and the front) and connected the handheld device, while Poe slowly stroked and smiled sadly at his friend.

The machine began whirring, and she moved back to the front to speak with both members of her company who were looking at each other.

“I think I already know the problem, but to be sure I’m going to have to take a couple of panels out and have a look myself. If you’re comfortable with this, I’m just going to need you to move your head a little bit.”

While she reached into her toolkit to retrieve the necessary tools, BB-8 slowly rocked his head to the side where Poe stood, and Poe crouched down to be level with him. “Good boy, BB, good boy.” He praised, rubbing the top of the unit’s head.

Ali looked at the top of the round robot and cautiously prised off the white shell, exposing wires and motors below. As she did so, the diagnostics machine beeped its signal that the report was complete, and she leaned over to read the screen. “Uhh, right, that’s all okay then, so it’s a mechanical issue most likely…”

Looking back at the exposed structure, she could instantly tell Poe’s words had been true – he took great care of the fellow, as all the wires were neatly organised and tied with lots of space to see through.

But there was one thing missing, the element she’d expected was faulty to start with. Slowly, and so as not to disturb the droid too much, she manipulated the wires back and forward looking for a fault.

And then there it was – rolling loose inside the droid, a burnt out gyroscopic propulsion system, what she’d suspected was the issue all along. “Gotcha.” Ali muttered, grabbing Poe’s attention.

Beckoning him over to the machine, she flattened the wires with her hand so the view was clear. “Right there. It’s come loose, and it doesn’t look like it was working anyway.”

Her hand scooped up the small component, and she carefully pulled her arm back out of BB. The piece was blackened, and looked like it could crumble and fall apart at any second.

“Hold on, I’ll see what I’ve got. Sure I saw one of these not so long ago.” She passed it to Poe, who was staring at it very intensely, while Ali walked into her storeroom through an arch on the room’s right wall.

 Poe studied the piece that caused his friend so much trouble, and then looked up to where Ali had gone. He walked slowly towards the adjacent room and his mouth gaped at the size of the thing.

Shelves upon shelves of mechanical parts lined the walls and formed aisles across the room. How on earth did she have so much stuff? On second thoughts, how did she have so much knowledge of this? 

She was incredibly young, much younger than he was expecting when he was told to go to the best droid technician in the galaxy according to someone at the base. If Finn had been around, Poe would have probably asked him for help and resolved to sort it out himself, but he’d been out on a mission with Rey at the crucial time.

“BB series… BB…” Ali mumbled, making her way along the rows of metal shelves. “Ah, here. Now what was your droid again?”

“BB-8.” Poe replied, watching her every move, in both hope and wonder. He also noticed as she walked further into the room she seemed to be carrying her left leg a little awkwardly, resting her hand onto her thigh.

“One of the later series then… No, that’s not it. Uh… here! Gyroscope, gyroscope. What’s that doing there? That internal orbiculate motor belongs back there.” She murmured to herself, tossing it gently into the older series box. “Wait, wait, there!”

Triumphantly she held aloft a small device identical to the one in Poe’s hand, although noticeably less charred. Ali sped back to him and a big smile spread on his face.

“How do you have so much stuff?” He asked, genuinely intrigued although desperate to fix his droid.

“… I may be a bit of a collector.” She answered, slightly ashamedly as she walked back to the table. “Sometimes, you just come across things that people brush off as scrap or meaningless, when actually it’s a part worth hundreds of credits and an integral part of a ship or droid. I have a keen eye!” Ali concluded, leaning in to Poe for the last proud statement, grinning and widening her eyes in emphasis.

“Well, BB, looks like you’ll be patched up in no time!” She smiled, leading to many happy chirps and beeps. Positioning herself by the droid, Poe stood next to Ali and tried to watch what she was doing without getting in her way.

With great care, she held the wires back again and slid her hand into BB-8, looking for the central point where the component connects. The gyroscopic piece sits in the centre of the droid, suspended and held by internal arms which each line up with a point on the system’s support structure.

“So, they have to line up there,” she said, demonstrating what she meant as best as possible to the head over her shoulder, “but you fix it at this point first,” referencing the cylindrical shape on the end of an arm pointing straight down from the top of the robot.

“The top arm of the gyroscope slots up into there, and then you turn it right, push it up, turn it left then right, and then flick this lever down to secure it. The catch on all of the supporting arms is flipped over, and then it should be fixed! I’d give it a wiggle just to be sure it’s tight, and then spin the centre a little bit to check the important bit moves smoothly ‘cause otherwise you’ll just have to do it all over again. Yeah?”

Ali looked at Poe, who had an expression which suggested ‘I understood every word you just said, but I don’t know if I’d be able to do it myself’.

 

* * *

 

“Okay then BB-8,” she chirped, removing the rubber circle while keeping a hand resting on the droid, “I want you to carefully roll forwards for me.” With head still cocked to the side, the droid slowly edged forward, Ali spreading her hands out just in case it rolled too far.

“Okay, now back,” she instructed, and the droid complied moving to the far edge of the table. Poe’s eyes lit up, and his smile became a toothed grin.

“Alright, now turn left and then move forwards,” she asked and the little unit fulfilled the task much quicker, excited at being in control again. It sat on the end of the table and beeped away to itself, and she skipped over to stop BB-8 falling off.

“Right then, good stuff, now let me get these panels back on you and let you off so you don’t fall!” Ali chuckled, and the droid moved back towards her. She quickly clipped the panels back on and sealed everything that needed sealing up, before stepping back and allowing Poe to move BB back onto the ground.

“Feel free to have a run around outside, BB.” She remarked, and it seemed this was already the first thing on his mind as he sped out of the door. Meanwhile Ali returned her tools and kit to the shelves behind, and then walked with Poe up to the arched house entrance.

BB was running up the sand’s small inclines, and then speeding back down them, again and again while Ali and Poe watched on, greatly amused by the sight. “Thank you.” Poe said, softly and with great gratitude evident in his voice.

“No worries.” Ali replied, smiling.

“We should probably talk about payment.”

“None needed. Friend for a friend.” Ali smirked, looking at the Resistance badge on the side of his jacket. He noticed her gaze, and the appreciation on his face grew even more.

“You sure?”

“Yeah, that was hardly the most taxing thing I’ve ever done. I’ll look over your ship if you want as well.”

“Not today, but thank you. It was just checked at the base.”

“Well if you change your mind...”

“Can’t believe I couldn’t fix him.”

“Poe, don’t worry about that. Honestly, BB is one of the most well kept droids I’ve ever seen. That’s partly why it was so easy to solve. Stick at it!” Ali beamed at him to reinforce her point, and Poe smiled back sheepishly.

 

* * *

 

Somewhere in front of them, a small whistling noise emerged and Ali instantly turned to see it. “R4? Oh I’m sorry, you should have come in.” She rushed to her droid, who had been outside, too far out that the ferocious sun burnt down on her, all that time Ali had been inside fixing BB-8.

Kneeling down in front of her, Ali caught the droid’s gaze and she gave a small quiet beep in response. “Come inside if you don’t want to be out here.” She said softly to the old droid, whose reason and cognitive function were past their best days.

She moved past Ali and trundled towards the arched entrance, Poe politely stepping out of the way.

There was a small lip at the entrance of the house, which R4 initially got caught on but then crashed over, going by the sound. Poe reacted expecting the droid to fall over, but she just about carried on upright and slunk into the back room.

He looked back in her direction just as Ali had rejoined him in the archway, pity but also slight confusion in his eyes.

“She’s an old, old droid. About to be sold off for salvage when I found her, but she just needed… well, new everything to be true. But it’s still her! Things… take a bit longer now, is all.”

Ali expected Poe to have something to say, but he stayed quiet – respectfully, almost.

“Actually,” she added after a comfortable silence, “I should make sure she’s not fried anything from being in the sun so long. I’m not forcing you to leave or anything, stay as long as you like but-”

“It’s alright, I understand. We’re probably late for some meeting, that’s how it usually is.” Ali smiled, old happy memories peeking up from the back of her mind, and Poe returned the expression. “You take care of yourselves, okay?”

“And you. I would suggest your life has significantly more peril involved than mine, however.”

“Yeah, thanks for the reminder…” Poe joked, grinning back at her.

“And hey, you ever need something else fixing… you sort of know where to find me.”

“Sure thing! I’ll let the General know of your good work.” Poe leaned back against the curved wall, returning to watch his droid bound about on the sand. Wistfully, Ali did the same, before hurrying inside to find and check on R4.

By the time she had checked her droid was okay, and then double and triple checked, the X-Wing had left.

Ali’s encounter with Poe Dameron left memories of a joyful time in her life, and so she sat back in her chair under the covered porch outside the house, and resumed dozing to pass the day away.

**Author's Note:**

> I have at least one or two other parts to add to this, but it probably won’t come until February (sorry, interviews!). 
> 
> There is more to come...


End file.
